Christian Wolff (philosopher)

Christian Wolff ( ennobled by Christian Freiherr von Wolff, in the Encyclopédie Chrétien Wolf; * January 24, 1679 in Breslau, † April 9, 1754 in Halle ) was a German polymath, lawyer and mathematician and one of the most important philosophers of the Enlightenment between Leibniz Kant and the Enlightenment among the most important representatives of natural law and regarded as the true founder of conceptual jurisprudence of the 19th century. The German philosophy owes its terminological foundation; defined many of his concepts such as consciousness, meaning, attention or to be later adopted into everyday language. Wolff also had a significant influence on the Prussian legislation.

Life

Christian Wolff was born in 1679 in Breslau. The bi-denominational ( both Lutheran- Protestant as well as Catholic ) character of the standing time under Austrian administration Silesian city coined the students. With eight years was Christian Wolff, even Lutherans, on the Maria Magdalena Gymnasium in Breslau. According to his own statements, he also pursued the Catholic worship and discussed philosophical and theological questions with the Wroclaw Jesuit students. The rector of the grammar school at that time was Christian Gryphius, a son of the poet Andreas Gryphius of Glogau. One of his most important teacher was Kaspar Neumann, who has greatly influenced his career.

From 1699 Wolff studied theology in Jena, but especially physics and mathematics. He habilitated in 1702 and lectured from 1703 privately at the University of Leipzig, where he also worked as a part preacher.

In 1706 he became professor of mathematics and philosophy at the University of Halle. 1710 Christian Wolff was appointed a member of the Royal Society and in 1711 the Berlin Academy of Sciences. In the same year Wolff met the classics of Chinese philosophy in the Latin translation of Father François Noël ( 1651-1729 ). The intensive reading of the works of Confucius and Mencius inspired Wolff in 1721 for his " speech on the practical philosophy of the Chinese " at the University of Halle. In this speech served Confucius and the Confucian tradition as witnesses of an ethic that had characterized independently of the Christian faith over thousands of high culture. His opponents accused pietistic Wolff in the wake of atheism; it meant that he give up his post in 1723 and the town hall had to leave I. within 48 hours due to the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm command. But Wolff studied the Chinese classics in translation by Noel until his death in the year, 1754. His whole work is permeated with quotations and allusions to this reading, which can be regarded as evidence of the fruitful encounter between Western and Chinese philosophy. He went to Hesse, where he taught until 1740 at the Philipps- University Marburg with great success. One of his students was Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov, now bears his name, the Lomonosov University in Moscow. The Empress Catherine I. (Russia) appointed him a member of the St. Petersburg Academy, he also was a foreign member of the Académie des Sciences in Paris. Frederick II of Prussia called him back in 1740 to Halle in 1743 he became Chancellor of the university, two years later ennobled by the Duke of Bavaria and Elector Maximilian Joseph in his capacity as imperial vicar for baron.

Wolff died on April 9, 1754 in Halle, the whereabouts of his grave is not known to this day entirely.

The scientific study of the biography of the philosopher Wolff is a desideratum of research. Apart from individual studies are so far available only the work of Baumeister ( 1738), Gottsched (1755 ) and Wuttke (1841 ). Autographs of the philosopher are kept, among other things in the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Library.

Work

From Wolff's work, the first German education went out in philosophy. " Wolffian ", supporters of the philosophers, there were almost all universities of the Holy Roman Empire. Their influence in teaching and scientific research dominated for decades. Even outside the academic sphere Wolff had followers. Nobles, such as Ernst Christoph von Manteuffel, Frederick II of Prussia in his Crown Prince and Luise Dorothea of Saxe- Gotha -Altenburg, were also under his supporters as French Protestant religious refugees in Prussia, about Jean Henri Samuel Jean Deschamps and Formey. Large parts of the trailer Wolff were cross-linked in the 1730s and 1740s in companies and by correspondence and successfully promoted the work and ideas of the philosophers.

Wolff's philosophy is a systematic expression of rationalism, resulting from various sources, Leibniz, Descartes, scholasticism Thomas Aquinas and Francisco Suarez ' feeds. Wolff has long been primarily attributed to the " systematization " of the philosophy of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, although differences between Wolff and Leibniz, for example, in the Monadology, must not be overlooked that were already stressed by Wolff himself and worked out reinforced by recent research.

Wolff is both defenders of a congruent complement of reason and revelation ( theologia naturalis, 2 vols 1736/1737 ) and an adherent of the Platonic idea of ​​" Philosophenkönigtums " ( De philosopho regnante et de lively philosopher ante, in: Horae subsecivae Marburgenses, 1730 ). While his philosophy was sharply attacked in the 1720s and 1730s, especially by the Lutheran orthodoxy and pietistic Protestant side, and placed under Atheism suspected Wolff grew in the 1740s powerful opponents in the empiricist English ( Newtonianism ) and skeptic (Voltaire ) to materialistic ( de Lamettrie ) French philosophy. A at this stage, however, increasing positive reception of the Enlightenment philosophy of Wolff is observed in the Catholic parts of Europe, especially in Italy, often with Jesuits and Benedictines.

Wolff postulated in his " Preliminary Discourse on Philosophy in General " three main types of knowledge:

• Historical knowledge (Wolff § 3: " The knowledge of what is happening and that it is in the material world or in the immaterialen substances we call historical knowledge. " )
• Philosophical knowledge (Wolff § 6: " The knowledge of the reason of what is happening or is called philosophical knowledge. " )
• As well as the mathematical knowledge ( Wolff § 14: "The knowledge of the quantity of things we refer to as mathematical knowledge. " )

Writings (selection )

• Initial reasons Aller Mathematical knowledge managed, 1710
• Excerpt from the initial reasons of any Mathematical Sciences, later edition, 1772
• Vernünfftige Gedancken of the Kräfften of the human mind and its proper Gebrauche in Erkäntnis of truth, 1713
• Elementa matheseos universae, 1713-1715
• Discovery of the true cause of the miracle of the multiplication stretchers Getreydes, 1718 Illustrated " forcefully", Halle 1719

• German: principles of natural law and Voelcker, 1754 and digitized full text in German Text Archive

• Letters from Christian Wolff from the years 1719-1753, St. Petersburg 1860
• Correspondence between Leibniz and Christian Wolf, Halle 1860
• Collected Works, ed. and Edit. by J. École et al, Georg Olms, Hildesheim et al 1962ff.
• The correspondence between Christian Wolff and Ernst Christoph von Manteuffel 1738-1748 Transcriptions from the manuscript holdings of the University Library of Leipzig ( signatures MS 0345, MS 0346, MS 0347 ), Part One:. Letters No. 1 to 150 (11 May 1738 to 30 December 1743 ); Part Two: Letters No. 151-314 (January 5, 1744 to March 24, 1747 ); Part Three: Letters No. 315-488 ( March 26, 1747 to November 5, 1748), ed. available from Catherine Middell and Hanns -Peter Neumann, Preprint as of February, 2013, on the Internet at: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bsz:14-qucosa-106475

• Speech on the practical philosophy of the Chinese. Lat.-dt., trans. and ed. v. Michael Albrecht. Meiner, Hamburg, 1985 ( = Philosophical Library, Vol 374), ISBN 978-3-7873-0795-1.
• First philosophy or ontology (§ § 1-78 ). Philosophia Prima sive Ontologia. Lat.-dt., trans. and ed. v. Dirk Effertz. Meiner, Hamburg 2005 ( = Philosophical Library, Vol 569 ), ISBN 978-3-7873-1720-2.
• Introductory treatise on philosophy in general ( Discursus praeliminaris ), trans. and ed. v. Günter Gawlick and Lothar Kreimendahl. From man - Holzboog, Stuttgart 2006 ( = research and materials for German Enlightenment Dept. 1. Texts, Vol 1), ISBN 3-7728-1523-5.